EXERCISE IS GOOD FOR YOU...
Dr Fergus Dignan from the Station Medical Centre at Boscombe Down encourages us all to ‘Just Do It…’
H
alf way through the year, many resolutions made and broken! Sorry for the cynicism but that is one of life’s realities. For
those of you whose resolve continues – well done! For those who had intended to make regular exercise one of 2011’s aims, but have given up, then please read on.
Naturally, for those who have to oblige, the biannual fitness test is motivation enough to get fit, but there are plenty of reasons for one to STAY fit. Think about it, we have evolved over 150,000 years and some of the genes that we have inherited are what made us successful hunter gatherers. It is marvellous that we no longer have to run around chasing after bison and the like, but these same genes have deleterious effects on us if we become sedentary. For example, the body stores excess calories very efficiently, hence western society’s obesity epidemic: a combination of excessive calorie intake and lack of exercise.
What is regular exercise? The general medical consensus is a minimum of
three times per week of at least moderate physical
activity, for at least half an hour on each occasion. That is activity that will cause sweating and breathlessness. A more
scientific approach would be to use a heart monitor
and aim for a target heart rate range as follows:
30 Envoy Summer 2011
220 minus YOUR AGE multiplied by 0.7 eg age 40 years: 220-40=180; 180 x 0.7=126 Then repeat the calculation using a multiplication factor of 0.8 instead of 0.7 180 x 0.8=144
Therefore a 40 year old should aim for a target heart rate range during exercise of between 126 and 144 beats per minute. A word of caution: do not attempt to achieve this if you have not done any exercise in recent weeks/months/years. In any case you should build up your fitness gradually, and advice can be sought from ourselves and the PTIs.
As your fitness levels improve you will notice that your heart rate will be lower for the same amount of work. This is because not only will your heart muscle get bigger but thousands of other mechanisms by which oxygen is carried around your body will become more efficient. A further word of caution: it is unnecessary and potentially hazardous to increase the target heart rate above the upper limit for your age as described in the calculation above. Furthermore the law of diminishing returns applies here. From no exercise to moderate exercise results in enormous health benefits; moderate exercise to very strenuous exercise results in few additional benefits (apart from maybe winning a gold medal in the Olympics!).
Here is a list of some of the benefits of exercise (the list is not exhaustive, no pun intended):
Ageing: Regular exercise slows down the ageing process! A fascinating study undertaken in Germany in 2010 supported this. Two groups of 20-35 year olds were compared, one group was composed of very fit athletes, the other group took no exercise at all. Their lifestyles
were otherwise similar. DNA was analysed and it was found that the athletic group had longer telomeres. A telomere is the end bit of a chromosome and in general terms, the shorter the telomere, the shorter the life span of that individual. Our telomeres gradually shorten as we get older, but it would appear that regular exercise slows this process down. Of further note, Alzheimer’s disease is less likely to develop in those who take regular exercise.
Blood pressure: Although blood pressure rises during exercise in order to maximise oxygen uptake into the muscles, regular exercise results in lowered blood pressure at rest. This applies even to people already taking anti hypertensive medication and can sometimes result in a reduction in medication required to control the blood pressure.
BMI (Body Mass Index): The BMI will tend to drop with exercise as more calories are burnt up, and exercise should always be used in conjunction with dieting if trying to lose weight. Dieting alone is unlikely to work.
Bone strength: The forces that travel up our skeleton as we run are quite considerable. Even running at a moderate pace can result in a force five times greater than that experienced at a walking pace. What this does is to stimulate bone growth. Hence regular weight bearing activity can prevent osteoporosis (bone thinning) when we get older.
Cancer: Exercise reduces the risk of various cancers, including colon and breast cancer. It is thought that the mechanism is related to the immune system (and see below). Exercise boosts the levels of a certain type of white cell
www.raf-ff.org.uk
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56